Jimmy Boyd
Rangers at A's
Play: A's
Oakland is showing great value here at home against the Rangers tonight. The A's are swinging a hot bat right now, as they have totaled 26 runs on 43 hits in their last 3 games. I'm counting on the offense to keep it going here against Derek Holland of the Rangers. Holland has really struggled on the road, posting a 5.97 ERA and 1.407 WHIP in 7 starts. He's also 0-3 with a 5.16 ERA in his last 5 appearances against the A's. Oakland will counter with their ace Sonny Gray, who has shown signs in his last two starts to returning to the dominant ace of this staff. Gray allowed 1 run on 5 hits in 5 innings in his first start since 5/20 at Houston on 6/5. He then allowed just 2 runs on 5 hits in 7 2/3 innings at Cincinnati in his most recent outing. Hard to not like his chances of keeping it going, as he's 7-3 with a 1.92 ERA and 1.095 WHIP in 10 career starts against the Rangers. Texas is 1-4 in Holland's last 5 road starts, while the A's are 6-1 in their last 7 home games, 8-2 in their last 10 against a left-handed starter and 6-1 in Gray's last 7 home starts against a team with a winning record.
SPORTS WAGERS
Detroit +171 over CHICAGO
Mike Pelfrey is 1-6 with a 4.68 ERA. On the road, Pelfrey is 0-4. Pelfrey did something in 2015 to get the attention of Detroit scouts, who apparently supported Detroit’s interest in him during the off-season. While Pelfrey showed strong command in the second half last year, it came with zero underlying support, 6.0% swing and miss rate, 54% first-pitch strike rate and 39% ball%. He’s doing much of the same this year. Meanwhile, Chris Sale is 10-2 with a 2.87 ERA. Looks like an easy choice, no? We say, “Not so fast”.
Surface stats heavily influence lines and Sale’s surface stats are fantastic. It is under the hood where there are signs of trouble. Sale's swing and miss % is representative of levels below 7 K’s/9 and his first-pitch strike rate/Ball% indicate that his control level is not what it appears to be. Sale is absolutely on the verge of walking more batters. Swing and miss % on Sale's strikeout pitches are down significantly in 2016. His change-up (20% swing and miss the past two years) is down to 12% and his slider (15% the past two years) is down to 10%. He is throwing his change-up less and it's easy to see the apparent correlation between cutter use % and swing and miss/K-rate percentages. A very fortunate BABIP and a favorable strand rate have also contributed to the 1+ run gap between ERA & xERA. Though Sale has lost 2 mph off of his fastball this year, that alone is not a major cause for concern since he has been very effective with less velocity in the past (see 2012 & 2013). The 27-year-old ace has the track record of better things and may very well rebound over the course of the season. However, with fortunate results and fortunate skills there is legitimate cause to think he can't sustain this level, making this a great time—perhaps even the optimal moment—to sell-high on Chris Sale. When we see a total of o9 -116 in a game that involves Sale, alert signs go off. Sale’s 32%/31%/36% groundball/line-drive/fly-ball rate over his last 38 innings covering six starts is more reason for concern. The Tigers are seeing beach balls right now and they may go deep on Sale more than once. Big overlay.
Bruce Marshall
Detroit +174
Chris Sale's fast start this season is now way back in the rear-view mirror, as he has allowed 17 runs and 34 hits (5 homers), plus nine walks over his last four starts covering 22 2/3 IP (6.75 ERA and 1.90 WHIP). Now he faces a Tigers lineup that has scored 20 runs the past two nights at The Cell and beat Sale -4 on June 4 at Comerica Park. Meanwhile, two consecutive quality start for Detroit starter Mike Pelfrey.
Jack Jones
Washington Nationals -136
The Washington Nationals want to make a statement that they are going to be in the NL pennant race for the long haul with the Chicago Cubs. After splitting the first two games of this series, I look for the Nationals to take Game 3 at home tonight behind their ace.
Stephen Strasburg has yet to lose in 2016. Indeed, he's 10-0 with a 3.03 ERA and 1.070 WHIP in 13 starts. He has recorded a whopping 110 strikeouts in 86 innings. Strasburg has also posted a 2.18 ERA and 1.064 WHIP in three career starts against Chicago.
Plays against all underdogs with a money line of +100 or higher (CHICAGO CUBS) - after having won 4 or 5 of their last 6 games, a top-level team winning at least 62% of their games playing a team with a winning record are 87-34 (71.9%, +41.4 units) over the last five seasons.
The Cubs are 5-12 in Jason Hammel's last 17 starts during game 3 of a series. The Nationals are 35-17 in Strasburg's last 52 starts. Washington is 19-7 in Strasburg's last 26 home starts.
Brandon Lee
Rays -117
Tampa Bay is worth a look here as a small home favorite on Wednesday. The Rays are red-hot at the moment, as they are 8-2 in their last 10. Seattle on the other hand is in a major funk. The Mariners have lost 3 straight and 8 of their last 11 overall. Neither starter comes into this game in great form, but I give the advantage here to Tampa Bay's Drew Smyly, as the Mariners are hitting just .240 with a .280 OBP against left-handed starters this season. Smyly has also pitched much better at home than his ERA would suggest. He has a 4.70 ERA in 5 home starts, despite a sensational 0.913 WHIP, as he's allowed just 22 hits and 6 walks in 30 2/3 innings at home this season.
Dave Price
St. Louis Cardinals -117
This is a very generous price to get the St. Louis Cardinals at home. I know Adam Wainwright isn't having his best season, but he's better than Collin McHugh. Wainwright is 2-2 with a 4.34 ERA and 1.259 WHIP in 6 home starts this year, and 1-1 with a 3.60 ERA and 0.750 WHIP in his last 3 starts, so he is clearly getting it figured out. Wainwright owns the Astros, going 13-1 with a 1.43 ERA and 0.994 WHIP in 15 lifetime starts against them. McHugh is 5-5 with a 5.22 ERA and 1.500 WHIP in 13 starts this year, and 2-3 with a 5.81 ERA in 6 road starts. He is also 0-1 with a 5.00 ERA in 2 lifetime starts vs. St. Louis. Wainwright is 79-35 (+31.7 Units) against the money line after a loss in his career. The Cardinals are 9-1 in their last 10 after scoring 2 runs or less in their previous game. St. Louis is 43-19 in Wainwright's last 62 starts overall.
Brandon Shively
White Sox -171
I like the White Sox here Wednesday night. I initially leaned on the ‘over’ in this game, but when looking at it closer, I would much rather lay the chalk with Chris Sale on the rubber. This is a complete pitching mismatch as the Tigers will call on Mike Pelfrey who is on my ‘auto-fade’ list.
The Tigers are 1-5 in Pelfrey’s six road starts this season. He is walking 3.8 batters per road start while averaging only three strikeouts. Walking more batters than you strikeout is not a recipe for success, especially when matched up against a Top 5 pitcher like Chris Sale. The White Sox are 10-3 in Sale’s 13 starts this season, including 5-1 at home.
The public is going to be shy about backing Sale here because he has given up 20 hits (4 HR) and 9 runs his last two starts. My feeling here is that Sale is too good of a pitcher to get rocked again. Sure, it can happen, but great pitchers tend to have the composure to tweak their mechanics and bounce back quickly with a quality outing. Sale doesn’t need to be perfect either; he just needs to be better than Pelfrey which should not be hard to do.
Another edge we have here is the better bullpen as the White Sox ‘pen has a 2.40 ERA with a 90% save conversion rate. The Tigers bullpen has a 4.76 ERA on the road with a 1.46 WHIP.
The White Sox are 5-1 in Sale’s last six home starts vs the Tigers. The one loss was when he was opposed by Max Scherzer. In fact, the White Sox have lost 3 home games vs the Tigers in Sale’s 8 career home starts. Two of those losses were against Scherzer and the other was against Rick Porcello. Obviously, Mike Pelfrey is the polar opposite of both of those pitchers. My point here is we have a pitching mismatch along with the better bullpen.
Injuries: Victor Martinez, Cameron Maybin, and Mike Aviles are all listed as questionable for the Tigers.
Umpire Trends: Home Team’s as a -145 to -185 favorite are a perfect 3-0 this year when Paul Emmel is behind home plate. The Home team has won 75% of the last 29 games vs Detroit when Emmel is behind home plate.
Chicago vs. Washington
Pick: Washington
Armed with a new contract, the Nats' Stephen Strasburg has an incredible 10-0 record in 13 starts and is in the NL Cy Young discussions. You don't get to 10-0 in early June without having some dynamite run support behind you, and that is certainly true in Strasburg's case. In fact, Strasburg is currently second in the NL in run support to another 10-game winner who happens to pitch for the Cubs (and is also the reigning Cy Young winner) in Jake Arrieta. In his 13 outings, the Nats have averaged almost seven runs (6.85) for Strasburg.
Power Sports
Pittsburgh Pirates at New York Mets
Pick: New York Mets
Including last night's 4-0 loss (no-hit through 7 innings), the Mets are now 1-9 head to head w/ the Pirates since the start of 2015. But hope is on the way tonight in the form of Noah Syndergaard, who gets the start. Syndergaard was on the hill for that one Mets victory over the Bucs, which took place exactly one week ago.
Last Wednesday saw Syndergaard allow just three runs, two earned, which was good enough to beat the man who shut the Mets down last night. Rookie Jameson Tallion was literally unhittable for seven innings Tuesday, but good news for Mets fans here is that they won't have to see him again the rest of the season. Tonight, they'll instead be facing Jeff Locke, who in his last start permitted a whopping 11 ER. That's more than Syndergaard has allowed in his last seven starts combined!
Locke/Pirates supporters will want to point to the fact that the disastrous outing took place at Coors Field, but the bottom line is that it was the third time already this year where the southpaw has given up at least six runs in a start. Syndergaard has a 0.981 WHIP in six home starts this year and the most runs he's given up in any start is four. It's time for the Mets' "luck" vs. the Pirates to turn and as he's already shown, Syndegaard is the "man for the job."
Harry Bondi
KANSAS CITY +130 over Cleveland
After cashing another FREE WINNER with the Cubs last night, let's take a big dog and go against one of baseball's best pitchers. Never a long term strategy to go against the Indians Corey Kuber but he is 0-3 liftime at Kaufman Stadium and we are backing the defending World Series Champs who have won 8 straight at home. Royals Rock Cleveland, take KC.
Bob Balfe
Rays -120
Seattle jumped out to a big lead yesterday and blew the game. Tonight they face left handed starting pitching which they have not had much success with. I am not a fan of backing a team after the blow a nice size lead as they give the opponent tons of confidence. Look for Tampa to edge their way back to a .500 ball club by the end of the weak.